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SPEECH OF ELIHU ROOT AT 
DURLAND^S RIDING ACADEMY 
NEW YORK, OCTOBER 31, 1908 



WASHINGTON : 
SUDWARTH PRINTING COMPANY 

1908 



SPEECH OF ELIHU ROOT AT 
DURLAND'S RIDING ACADEMY 
NEW YORK, OCTOBER 31, 1908 



WASHINGTON : 
SUDWARTIl l-RINTINC COMI'ANY 






By Transfer 
AUG 3 1914 






Fellow Citizens : 

I wish to state some reasons which lead nic to believe that 
Mr. Bryan's election to the Presidency would be followed by 
general and long continued business disaster ; that the recov- 
ery, now in progress, from the panic of last year, would stop ; 
that production Avould be curtailed, many workmen thrown 
out of employment, wages lowered, the market for farm pro- 
ducts and manufactures reduced, and the income upon invest- 
ments of private individuals, of savings banks and insurance 
companies, of charitable and educational institutions, in a 
great measure cut off; and that a long period of stagnation and 
distress would ensue, such as we experienced between 1893 
and the election of Mr. McKinlej^ in 1896. 

Whatever may be the development of our industrial system 
in the future, no considerable productive enterprise goes on 
under the present system without the use of capital as well as 
labor. Sometimes iu this combination capital gets 
more than its fair share of the profit and sometimes 
the capital is lost altogether, and then there is no 
profit and there are no more wages coming from the 
enterprise that has failed. Just as productive- enter- 
prise stops when there is a .strike because labor is not satis- 
fied with its wages, so productive enterprise stops when the 
owner of capital ceases to believe that he will get back his in- 
vestment with a profit. I believe that thoughtful men, gener- 
ally, realize that the effect of labor unions in securing fair 
and steady Avages and just conditions for labor is beneficial to 
the whole community, the employer as well as the employed. It 
is equally clear that stability, certainty, and a natural, even 



development in law, administration and social conditions, are 
important for the welfare of the whole community, employed 
•as well as employers, because these are necessary to enable 
investors to forecast the future and form a reasonable judg- 
ment as to whether if they put their money into productive 
enterprises they will make a profit or will lose what they put 
in. Threats of violent changes which make it impossible to 
form a judgment as to the future course of business, still more, 
threats of changes which present the probability of loss, check 
investment, and, therefore, check production immediately. 
The essential feature of all business depressions is loss of 
confidence in the future. Without confidence in the future the 
manufacturer is bound to reduce his purchases of raw materials 
and his output. AVithout confidence in the future the merchant 
is bound to reduce his stock to the low^est possible point. With- 
out confidence in the future, railroad and industrial securities 
<-annot be sold, new construction, extensions and renewals nec- 
essary to keep pace with active business development cannot 
be made. All these mean men out of employment and wages 
reduced, and men out of employment and wages reduced mean 
a decrease of the purchasing power of the country, so that the 
products of the farm and the factory will not find a market, 
and their failure to find a market would necessarily lead to still 
further contraction and the continuance of the process until 
some great event like the resumption of specie payments of 
1S79, or the election of McKinley in 1896, happens to restore 
confidence. 

I cannot doubt that the election of INIr. Bryan would 
destroy the confidence necessary to the continuance of indus- 
trial and commercial enterprises ; and I think that his election 
would justly destroy confidence. 

Any change of government from the administration of a 
part.\' whose principles and practical workings are well known 



and whose action it is practically easy to forecast, to a new set 
of men who belong to another party and whose course in office 
is a matter of conjcctiire. in itself tends to create doubt and 
hesitancy, and the possibility of such cliange always keeps 
majiy business enterprises in suspension before every Presiden- 
tial election. 

The possibility of Mr. Bryan's election, however, involves 
much more than this ordinary doubt. 

We know that he is a politician of great skill, who. whih' real- 
ly a Populist in fact, as he was formerly ])y political affiliation, 
has secured control of the machinery of the Democratic party. 
He advocates a great variety of measures, which are grotes- 
quely inconsistent with the pi-inciples of Thomas Jefferson, 
which would result in the complete abandonment of the doc- 
trine that "That governnunit governs best which governs 
least," and which would ])ring about an all powerful cen- 
tralized government in Washington (•()m])letely destructive 
of State sovereignty. Yet the disciples of Jefferson follow him 
meekly and appear happy to eat out of his hand. He has taken 
the leadership of those elements of the Democratic party which 
wrecked the second administration of ^Ir. Cleveland, and many 
of Mr. Cleveland's friends and followers, iiuule of less stern 
material than that man of strong convictions and high cour- 
age have attorned to the new leader. It appears probable, 
therefore, that if the Democratic party is put in power with 
]\Ir. Bryan as President he will be able to try in actual adminis- 
tration and legislation the views which he has expressed. In the 
Democratic party there seems to be no opinion except ]\Ir. 
Bryan's, and where he leads the party is sure to follow; what 
he wishes to have done the party is sure to undertake, if it 
comes into power. 

The suggestion has been made that a Republican Senate 
might stand as a bar to carrying out ^Ir. Bryan's ideas al- 



tliough he should be elected President. In my judgment that 
is a delusion. Careful observation of the Senate leaves little 
doubt that if the people of the country were to give their 
approval to i\Ir. Bryan by electing him President and by sup- 
porting him with a Democratic House, a sufficient number of 
Senators elected as Republicans would yield to the pressure 
of the Bryan policies backed by the force of that popular en- 
dorsement, to give effect to almost any measure which he might 
propose. Mr. Bryan has publicly declared that he expects this, 
and I think his expectation would be justified. 

The substantial question before us, therefore, is what would 
be the effect upon the productive enterprise of the country to 
know that Mr. Brj^an's views wer(! to be made effective by the 
entire force of the National Government. Let us seek an ans- 
wer to that question by recalling the views which he has ex- 
pressed. 

I need not spend time over ]\Ir. Bryan's devotion to the free 
coinage of silver. He has omitted that from his platform this 
year, because it no longer affords a popular issue in the face 
of the logic of events which has disproved every prophecy 
upon which he staked his reputation for political wisdom in his 
campaign of 1896. But he has not abjured it. In his speech 
at Albany in 1896, he said : 

"The Democratic party has begun a war of extermi- 
nation against the gold standard. We ask no quarter; 
we give no quarter. We shall prosecute our warfare 
until there is not an American citizen who dares to ad- 
vocate the gold standard." 

At KnoxvillcHH^^HHHH on the 5th of October, flMi 
he said : 

"If there is anyone who believes that the gold stand- 
ard is a good thing, or that it must be maintained, I 



warn him not to cast his vote for me because I promise 
him that it will not be maintained in this country 
longer than I am able to get rid of it." 

The business men of the country will not forget that under 
our laws it would still be possible if Mr. Bryan were President 
and a time of stringency were to come, to completely destroy 
the single gold standard by executive action and to bring 
on a trial of his favorite theory through the enact- 
ment of a law for the free coinage of silver. 

He has declared himself in favor of the initiative and refer- 
endum, and he has never abjured that, although he has omit- 
ted it from his platform because he has seen that the Ameri- 
can people shrank from destroying the system of representa- 
tive government under which they have grow^n so great and un- 
der which a larger measure of liberty and justice has been at- 
tained than under any other form of government the world 
has know. 

He has repeatedly and formally declared himself in favor 
of the Government ownership of railroads and he stands by 
that declaration. In his speech at the great reception given 
in New York upon his return from Europe in August, 1906, 
Mr. Bryan declared: 

''I have reached the conclusion that there will be no 
permanent relief on the railroad question from the dis- 
crimination between individuals and between places and 
from extortion in rates until the railroads are the prop- 
erty of the Government and are operated bj^ the Gov- 
ernment in the interest of the people. ' ' 

He has repeated that declaration many times and in many 
places. He refrains from pressing it now because it would 
not help to elect him, but he holds to it. He does not believe 
in the regulation of railroad rates or in the laws 



to prevent discrimination in rates. He believes those 
laws to be futile and sure to fail of effect. He 
would like to see the National Government become the owner 
of all the great railroads of the country, and an executive offi- 
cer, under his direction as president, controlling their opera- 
tions with the enormous horde of Federal officers necessary 
for their administration, and with the tremendous power 
over every State that such a control would give to him, 
skilled politician as he is. 

He proposes in his latest platform a bank deposit guar- 
antee scheme under which all the National banks of the 
country shall guarantee the payment of the deposits of all 
the other National banks. 

We have in this country a system of perfectly safe and 
sound savings banks in which over eight million and a half 
of depositors have deposits amounting to about three billions 
and a half of dollars. These depositors are for the most part 
wage earners, clerks, thrifty persons of small means not en- 
gaged in business. For the use of such persons in parts of 
the country where savings banks are not accessible the Re- 
publican party proposes to establish postal savings banks 
through which the Government wnll take charge of their sav- 
ings and keep them securely. Mr. Bryan's scheme does not 
touch this class of people or provide for the safety of this 
kind of deposit. It relates to the business banks, through 
which the business people of the country transact their busi- 
ness. A bank deposit is in effect a loan of money by the de- 
positor to the bank to be repaid at such time and in such 
amounts as the depositor indicates by drawing checks against 
the bank. We now have a free banking system under which 
any group of men w'ho can raise $25,000 can start a bank and 
invite deposits ; that is, can ask people to lend them their 
money to be repaid in the way I have described. As matters 



9 

stand now, ordinarily no man undertaking to start a bank 
will get any deposits, that is to say, will get business people 
to lend him their money, unless he is known and has a good 
reputation in the community. Business people will not en- 
trust their money to unknown or unfavorably known adven- 
turers. As a result our banking is as a rule honest and con- 
servative and the losses by depositors are exceedingly small. 
If, however, Mr. Bryan's scheme were to be adopted any set 
of scoundrels who could raise $25,000 could start a bank and 
could borrow money on the credit of the entire banking capi- 
tal of the United States ; for the depositors would know that 
it made no difference to them whether the men who asked 
for their deposits were incompetent or reckless speculators, 
or dishonest rogues, because if their deposits were lost in specu- 
lation or stolen, nevertheless the other banks of the country 
would pay them. Furthermore, the business of banking is 
conducted under widely different conditions in different 
parts of the country. Bank money can be loaned at twelve 
per cent in Oklahoma; in New York, Boston and Philadel- 
phia four per cent is a good rate. Some bankers are content 
to get only four per cent with the good security that can al- 
ways be had with a low rate of interest, while other bankers 
prefer to take the chance of a very high rate of interest to- 
gether with the risks that always accompany high rates of 
interest. Under Mr. Bryan's scheme the conservative, cau- 
tious, safe banker who is content with four per cent would 
have to bear the risks incurred by the twelve per cent banker, 
while the latter would take the twelve per cent profit, if all 
went well. Under Mr. Bryan's scheme the sound, conserva- 
tive bankers of the country would have no control whatever 
over the risks which would thus be imposed upon them. The 
burden of these risks would not be imposed upon the stock- 
holders of banks alone, but upon the great body of the de- 



10 



positors and borrowers from banks — the men who are en- 
gaged in conducting the legitimate business of the country ; 
for under the competition of our free banking system, the 
margin of banking profit is ordinarily very narrow, and any 
burden imposed ui)on the banks comes ultimately out of the 
depositors in reduced interest paid to them for their deposits, 
and out of the business men who borrow money from the 
banks in the increased rate charged against them for loans. 

Such a scheme as this is worse than would be a law to com- 
pel every merchant to endorse the notes of every other mer- 
chant for when notes are endorsed the amounts are known and 
the persons for whom they are endorsed are known. This 
scheme would require all the sound banks of the country and 
all the legitimate business transacted through them to endorse, 
out of sight and unseen, all the future obligations that may be 
contracted by an indefinite number of unknown persons. 

Mr. Bryan in his Lincoln speech of October 12th attacked 
Governor Hughes for vetoing the two-cent fare bill in the 
State of New^ York, and held up that veto as a reason wdiy the 
Republican party should not be continued in power. 

He kne"\v, as the whole country know^s, that at the same 
time W'hen Governor Hughes vetoed that bill he procured the 
passage by the Legislature of New York of a bill providing 
for a Public Service Commission charged with the duty of 
inquiring into the reasonableness of railroad rates what 
rates would enable the railroad companies to pay their ex- 
penses, maintain their roads and rolling stocks and still make 
a rea.sonable profit; and to regulate rates in accordance with 
the facts ascertained; and he knew^ that the ground of the 
veto of the two-cent fare bill was that the bill w^as passed 
by the Legislature of New York without any inquiry what- 
ever into such facts, but as a purely arbitrary act of power 
fixing the rate without any reference to the question whether 



11 



it would amount to confiscation of railroad property or not. 
Mr. Bryan's disapproval of Governor Hughes' course, there- 
fore, was an approval of a practice under which the people 
who travel upon the railroads of the United States shall fix 
their own fares by legislative enactment in accordance with 
what they wish to pay, without ascertaining or caring wheth- 
er the fare so paid will furnish a reasonable return to the 
railroad to enable it to pay its labor, buy its materials and 
return anj^ profit whatever to the capital invested. 

Mr. Bryan proposes in his latest platform that all articles 
entering into competition with trust controlled products shall 
be placed upon the free list. 

Examine this for a moment. The great evil of trusts lies in 
their driving out of business their smaller competitors, and af- 
ter these are driven out, putting up prices. The driving out 
of business is practically always done by unfair and oppressive 
means. Indeed, it can be done in no other way except in cases 
where the trust controls the whole raw material of manufac- 
ture, for wherever the raw material of manufacture can be ob- 
tained and competition has a fair chance, the moment prices 
are put up competition increases and the trust control de- 
creases. The Republican plan of dealing with trusts is to go 
after all the big concerns which are driving out competition by 
unfair practices, to compel them to stop and to punish them if 
they do not stop, so as to give the smaller competitors a fair 
chance. The whole railroad rebate system, for which so many 
punishments have been inflicted within the last few years, is 
an illustration of one of the unfair methods by which big con- 
cerns have been driving smaller concerns out of business. 
The essential idea of this method of dealing with trusts is to 
give the little concern a fair chance against the big concern. 
Mr. Bryan 's plan is that as soon as it is discovered that some 
manufacturing concern has got what he calls control of some 



12 



article, the article shall be put on the free list, taking off all 
protection whatever and ruining both the trust and all its 
competitors at the same time ; for, as a general rule, American 
manufacture cannot pay American wages and compete 
in our markets with European manufacture, paying Euro- 
pean wages, without some protection. The necessary 
effect of such a proceeding would be to close the 
American manufactories, throw the American wor'k- 
men out of employment and compel our people to make 
all their purchases of the particular articles concerned in 
Europe. This would not merely be ruinous to the competing 
American manufacturer as well as to the trust, but would be 
most disastrous in its effect upon mercantile trade. The pro- 
ducts of manufacture are distributed by our mercantile houses ; 
the wholesaler buys from the mill ; the retailer buys from the 
wholesaler and all over the country there are large stocks of 
goods kept at the points where they are available for the con- 
sumer. Under Mr. Bryan these merchants would be obliged 
continually to face the danger that the value of their stocks of 
goods might be suddenly greatly decreased by a decision of 
some officer somewhere that the articles which they have on 
their shelves are to be classed as trust controlled articles, and 
are to be put on the free list, and a flood of free foreign com- 
petition brought in to undersell them. 

Mr. Bryan's platform declares that as to all articles in 
which American manufacturers compete with foreign manu- 
factures the tariff must be reduced to a revenue basis ; that is 
to say, that no duty shall be imposed with a view of protecting 
American manufacture. Little attention is being paid to this 
subject in this campaign, but that is what ^Ir. Bryan proposes 
to do and will do if elected, and in electing him the American 
people would conmiit themselves to the abandonment of the 
policy of protection. 



13 



I shall not argue the question of protection and free trade 
here, but I suppose that the most earnest believers in the ulti- 
mate advantage of free trade would not dispute that the im- 
mediate effect of withdrawing protection would be to close a 
great multitude of American manufactories, turn the work- 
men employed in them into the street and render the capital in- 
vested in them valueless. It is with that immediate effect upon 
the business of the country that I am dealing now. and that 
would be the effect of Mr. Bryan's election. 

Mr. Bryan's platform proposes that any manufacturing or 
trading corporation engaged in interstate commerce — and all 
the large ones are engaged in interstate commerce — shall be 
required to take out a Federal license before it shall be permit- 
ted to control as much as twenty-five per cent of the products 
in which it deals, and that these licenses shall require all the 
concerns which hold them to sell to all purchasers in all parts 
of the country on the same terms after making due allowance 
for cost of transportation. All the leading concerns making 
or dealing in any of the tens of thousands of particular kinds 
of articles made and sold in this country are to be subject to 
this limitation. 

I will not dwell upon how the facts are to be determined for 
the purpose of enforcing such a provision. That must neces- 
sarily be by some Executive officer in Washington, for mani- 
festly it would be impossible that the courts should perform 
such an enormous task relating to all the great business of the 
country. I will not dwell upon the tremendous centralization 
of power in Washington which would be involved in this ; but 
I point to the fact that such a proposal would destroy 
the right of private contract on the part of the great pro- 
ducers and merchants of the country, and would impose upon 
all business the same limitations which are properly im- 
posed upon common carriers in the performance of their public 



14 



duty of transportation, for which they have received 
franchises from the public. Under such a provision no 
great manufacturer or merchant could make prices to his 
customers to suit the conditions and requirements of his trade. 
No matter how important it might be for him to reduce his 
stock, no matter how great might be the necessity of making 
sales to raise money for the continuance of his business, no 
matter how important it might be for him to keep his work- 
men employed he could not shave prices for the purpose of 
securing an advantageous contract below the prices at Avhich 
he had sold to somebody else in some other State. 

Manifestly to enforce this, it would be necessary that mer- 
chants and manufacturers should file schedules of their prices 
and then be subject to prosecution if they sold at any different 
prices. There is no manufacturer or merchant who will not 
recognize the impossibility of conducting the business of the 
country under any such system. 

I have now given eight specific instances in which Mr, Bryan 
has become known to us as the advocate of measures which the 
plain, common sense of the business men of the country recog- 
nizes as measures inconsistent with the success of enterprise and 
the safety of investment. These specific measures are the free 
coinage of silver, initiative and referendum, the Government 
ownership of railroads, the enforced guarantee of bank depos- 
its, the arbitrary fixing of railroad rates without inquiry into 
facts, the putting of trust controlled articles on the free list 
to the ruin of American competitors, the withdrawal of the 
protective element in the American tariff, the requirement of 
Federal licenses. ]\Iost of these a-re violations of those universal 
laws which control the development and progress of the busi- 
ness of the world, here and everywhere — not laws voluntarily 
adopted, but laws imposed by human nature, essential elements 



15 



in the great processes of production and trade and not subject 
to the control of any government whatsoever. 

Now, I ask you to consider the effect upon the business of 
the country of putting in control at Washington a man who 
has the will and the power to do all these things. 

What manufacturer will have the confidence to risk money 
in the purchase of raw material and of machinery, and 
payment of wages for manufacture if a majority of the 
people put into power a party which believes in withdrawing 
all protection from manufactured articles and in putting all 
such articles as some executive officer in Washington is moved 
to declare imder trust control upon the free list, so that at any 
moment the product of manufacture may be subjected to un- 
restricted foreign competition ? 

What merchant will have confidence to rislc money in 
the purchase of stocks of goods from foreign or from Amer- 
ican producers if some executive officer in Washington 
is liable at any moment to destroy their value by 
the removal of the duty under which they were purchased 
and has power to prevent their owner from selling them ac- 
cording to the needs of his business to such customers as he can 
find and at such prices as he can get ? 

Who is to put money into the extension and equipment of 
railroads necessary for the conduct of the business of the 
country if w^e put into power in Washington a party whose 
all-powerful leader in the President's chair proposes to take 
the property over into the hands of the Government at the 
Government's own valuation and is in favor of limiting the 
rates to be charged for its use by perfectly arbitrary legisla- 
tion adopted without any regard whatever to the cost of 
transacting the business or to the rates necessary to produce 
a profit? 

Who is to have confidence to put his money into the bank- 



16 



ing business when it is to be subject not merely to the risks 
involved in the judgment and integrity of the men whom he 
selects to manage it, but to be made a guaranty for the credit 
of all the unknown men who may find it useful for their 
schemes of speculation or dishonesty to go through the forms 
of taking out a charter under the free banking system? 

What confidence would there be in any business under a 
Government with the will and the power to destroy the gold 
standard and inaugurate the free coinage of silver, and 
threatening the destruction of our old and well-considered 
methods of representative legislation by the adoption of the 
unknown and untried system of the initiative and referendum? 

Nor are these specific proposals in themselves the only 
causes for the destruction of confidence which would be 
found in the election of ]\Ir. Bryan. The character and qual- 
ity of the man indicated by them is such that no one can tell 
what new patent remedy he may seize upon at any time to 
meet the political exigencies of the moment, or do away Avith 
conditions which cause dissatisfaction among any part of his 
followers. Unacquainted with the difficulties of administra- 
tion and unfamiliar with the complicated forces that move 
the tremendous machinery of our vast industrial life the 
habit of his mind is to seek cheap and easy remedies to cure 
deep-seated tendencies which require patience, the consider- 
ate wisdom of men who know the subject with which they 
are dealing, firm and persistent administration and popular in- 
struction and education. His tendency is to believe his own 
advertisements and to kill his patient with quack remedies. 

The business world distrusts a man of that temperament and 
justly distrusts him, for he can do infinite harm. The news 
of his election would bring doubt and distrust to the mind of 
every man having money to invest in American enterprises. 
It would prevent all new enterprise. It would reduce the 



17 



activity of all existing enterprises. Lack of confidence, con- 
traction, business depression, business failures, the stopping 
of interest and dividends, reduction in the expense of salaries 
and wages, more and still more workmen out of employment, 
reduced purchasing power of the })eople and a reduced market 
for farm, and factory prodiirts — all these in necessary suc- 
cession would be the inevitable result of endowing this danger- 
ous apostle of half truths, with the tremendous power of the 
National Government to rule and to ruin. 

But the courts ! 

Would not the courts set a limit upon Mr. Bryan's interfer- 
ence with the conduct of business? • Cannot the business men 
of the coimtry rely upon the courts to protect them in their 
Constitutional rights ? 

To that I answer, first, that very little capital will be inves- 
ted upon the understanding that it will be lost unless the in- 
vestor defeats the National Government in litigation. Invest- 
ments already made may seek to protect themselves by litiga- 
tion, but investments not yet nuide will never be made at all 
on those terms. 

I answer in the second place, that the possibility, indeed, the 
probability of ^Ir. Bryan's control of the courts presents the 
most serious danger which would follow his election. He has 
already given us evidence by his public utterances that he 
would, if he covild, re-constitute the courts in such a way that 
they should answer to the demands of what he deems to be pub- 
lic opinion. If elected President he will have an opportunity 
to re-constitute the Supreme Court of the United States, which 
stands as the great and indispensable bulwark of Constitu- 
tional right. When the next President is inaugurated four of 
the present Justices of the Suprenie Court will have passed the 
age of retirement. One will be seventy-six, a second seventy- 
five, a third seventy-one and a fourth seventy years of age. 



18 



Before the next Presidential term is finished a fifth will lack 
a few days of being seventy-two and a sixth will be in his sev- 
entieth year. It is practically certain that the President elec- 
ted in November will have the appointment of a large propor- 
tion of the members of the Court to fill the vacancies which will 
occur, and it is highly probable that he will have the appoint- 
ment of a majority of the members of the Court. What pro- 
tection would Constitutional rights have from the Court consti- 
tuted by Mr. Bryan? 

I call as a witness upon this question Mr. Samuel Gompers. 
On the 12th of this month he published an open letter, ad- 
dressed to "Men of Labor, Lovers of Human Liberty," in 
which he said : 

"The facts are that the Judiciary, induced by cor- 
porations and trusts and protected by the Republican 
party is, step by step, destroying government by laws 
and substituting therefor a government by Judges, who 
determine what, in their opinion, is wrong; what, in 
their opinion, is evidence ; who, in their opinion, is 
guilty, and what, in their opinion, the punishment shall 
be. It is sought to make of the judges irresponsible des- 
pots, and by controlling them, using this despotism in 
the interest of corporate power. 

The letter then described an unsuccessful appeal to the Re- 
publican party, and proceeded to say : 

"Labor's representatives then went to the Democratic 
party. That party made labor's contention its own. 
It pledged its candidates for every office to those reme- 
dies which labor had already submitted to Congress. 
The standard bearer of the Democratic party, Mr. Wil- 
liam J. Bryan, entered fully into the essence of this 
struggle and declared that the real issue in this cam- 
paign is: 'Shall the people rule?' 

"The Republican party and its candidate stands for 



19 



upholding and further extending into our country a 
despotic government vested in the judiciary. 

"The Democratic party and its candidate stands for 
government hy law vested in the people." 

Mr. Gompers is Mr. Bryan's chief ally in this campaign. 
The circular was issued in Mr. Bryan's interest for the pur- 
pose of attracting to hira the labor vote. Unless it is denied, 
and it has not been denied, this is to be taken as an authentic 
statement of Mr. Bryan's attitude towards the courts. 

The particular occasion of these declarations was the re- 
fusal of Congress to pass a bill which withdrew from the 
courts the right to restrain by injunction any boycott, wheth- 
er secondary or otherwise, however arbitrary, destructive 
and unjustifiable it might be, by means of a provision limit- 
ing injunctions to the protection of property rights, and en- 
acting that : 

"No right to carry on business of any 

particular kind, or at any particular place, or at all, 
shall be construed, held, considered or treated as prop- 
erty, or as constituting a property right." 

It is too plain for argument and is the law that the manu- 
facturer's right to use his machinery, the merchant's right 
to sell his goods, every man's right to use his property and 
carry on his business is a property right which constitutes 
the chief value of property, and that the legislation thus 
demanded, to withdraw this right of property from the pro- 
tection of the laws would be class legislation of the most dan- 
gerous and offensive character. To this, according to JMr. 
Gompers, Mr. Bryan and the Democratic party have assented. 

But the declarations of the circular go beyond the occa- 
sion which calls them forth, and set forth the true attitude 
of Mr. Brvan and his democracv toward the courts. In their 



20 



view it is not the Constitution as interpreted by the courts ; 
it is not the rules of law and the existing statutes as inter- 
preted by the courts; but it is the will of the people at the 
moment, expressed in some other way than through the 
courts, which is to govern ; and for the courts to render their 
decisions and issue and enforce their decrees in accordance 
with their opinion as to what the provisions of the Constitu- 
tion and the laws are, is despotism, unless that opinion agrees 
with the present wish of what Mr. Bryan and Mr. Gompers 
choose to call the people, as interpreted by them. 

This means the destruction of our judicial system. It means 
a subservient Venezuelan judiciary in place of an inde- 
pendent American judiciary. It means the sweeping away 
of all the protection that American Constitutions have thrown 
about the rights of property, the fruits of enterprise and the 
liberty of the individual. It means that if Mr. Bryan has the 
opportunity to reconstitute the Supreme Court he will make 
it the instrument of its own destruction and an accomplice 
in the surrender of that great judicial safeguard against the 
momentary influences of popular excitement, which has been 
the chief element in the security, the stability, and the progress 
of the American Republic. 

"What confidence will the business men of America have in 
venturing their capital in the risks of production and trade 
with the shadow of this great calamity looming large on the 
horizon of the Nation's future under the control of Mr. Bryan 
and a Democratic Congress. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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